———

Review of the Causes of Fratricide n November 12, 1758, during the French and Indian War, Colonel George Washington of the British Army led a detachment of infantry to take a hill near Loyall Hannon (now Loyalhanna), Pennsylvania occupied by French soldiers and their Indian scouts. The French fled after a brief exchange of fire. But hearing the firing, a second detachment—under the command of Lt. Colonel George Mercer— approached the hill to assist. They arrived at dusk and the day was foggy, making visibility poor. Each side seems to have mistaken the other for French and an intense fire fight broke out, killing between 13 and 40. 1 While the current high interest in combat fratricide is a direct result of U.S. experience in the Persian Gulf War, this tale shows clearly that fratricide is not a new problem. During the Persian Gulf War, incidents of fratricide received considerable press attention and caused international political friction.2 There was bewilderment among the public and press about how fratricide could occur. After all, shouldn’t it be obvious who are friends and who are foes? In addition, to some the losses from friendly fire seem less acceptable as an inevitable cost of war than are losses from enemy fire.3 1 The Papers of George Washingto~ Colonial Series, vol. 6, W.W. Abbo4 ed. (Charlottesville, VA: University Press of Virgini% 1988), pp. 120-123. A “detachment” could consist of between 200 and a thousand infantry. 2 Just a sample of the popular press stories about friendly fme includes: Bruce van Voorst, “They Didn’t Have to Die, ” Time, Aug. 26, 1991, p. 20; Joshua Hammer, “Risking Friendly Fire, ” Newsweek, Mar. 4, 1991, p. 33; David HackWorth, “Killed by Their Comrades, ” Newsweek, Nov. 18, 1991, pp. 45-46; Glem Frankel, “In Britain, Fallout from Friendly Fire, ” Washington Post, May 18, 1992, p. Dl; and David MOrnSOrL “Foes Not the Only Threat in the Gulf War,” Narional Journaf, Feb. 9, 1991, pp. 335-336. 3 Sensitive to the possibility of a different reaction to friendly fire losses, the Marine Corps readily admitted occurrences of friendly fwe but was reluctant to identi& precisely which deaths it caused. For example, a Marine Corps spokesman, Lt. Col. Ron Stokes, was reported as saying: “We don’t want to start painting guys with a different brush-these guys were killed by the enemy and these guys by friendly fire. They were all killed in a combat action. If you start breaking it down, we’re not certain that it benefits either the public or the families. See, ‘‘Kitled by Friend or Foe, It’s All the Same, ” The New York Times, Feb. 14, 1991, p. B18.

7

2

8 I Who Goes There: Friend or Foe?

The fratricide of the Persian Gulf War was unusual in some regards compared to that of past wars. Most striking was the apparently unprecedented high fraction of U.S. casualties resulting from fratricide; this was due in large part, of course, to the extremely low U.S. casualties inflicted by the enemy. In addition, the types of fratricide were different from other large mechanized land battles, such as those of World War II. In World War II, the most deadly reported individual incidents of fratricide were the result of bombing of friendly troops by friendly aircraft. Surface-to-surface fratricide resulted most often from indirect-fire weapons, that is, artillery fired at a target that the crews could not see. The Persian Gulf War had an unusually high fraction of fratricides from directfire weapons—for example, tanks-shooting mistakenly at other land targets, which they could see but misidentified. This chapter, a historical review of fratricide, shows how serious a problem fratricide has been in past wars and reveals patterns in the occurrence of fratricide in past wars that might suggest lessons for the future. There are difficulties with a historical approach. The movements of armies are usually well recorded, but the record of particular actions by front line soldiers that might lead to fratricide is spottier and less reliable. Thus, many casualties due to fratricide are never realized to be such, and many that are recognized as fratricide are probably never recorded as such. Within the military historical record, the record of fratricide is particularly suspect because fratricide is a mistake and a full airing can be embarrassing or traumatic and can end careers. Recording of fratricide has not been uniform. Casualty report forms, for example, have not 4

included fratricide as a cause. Thus, fratricides during the Vietnam War were cataloged under either ‘‘accidental self-destruction” or “misadventure. Colonel Washington’s unfortunate “misadventure” illustrates these problems well. After the Loyalhanna incident, Washington was criticized by some of his officers for losing his customary aplomb under fire, for which he was justly famous. What responsibility he felt after the action we can never know, but he made no mention of the circumstance of his casualties in the next day’s reports to his superior officers. In fact, he never mentioned the event in any of his writings until almost 30 years later when, in marginal comments on a draft of his own biography, he related a version in which Colonel Mercer clearly fires the first shot. The historical record does provide lessons. Many of the cases of fratricide include human errors, not just technical or tactical specifics. Because people change more slowly than machines, history probably provides some useful lessons for today. Very few works are devoted specifically to fratricide. One particular case of fratricide is probably the most famous because a popular book was written about it, Friendly Fire, by C.D.B. Bryan (also serialized in the New Yorker and the subject of a television series);4 this work deals primarily with a victim’s family and its dealings with the U.S. Government. Lt. Colonel Charles Schrader’s paper, Amicicide, contains far and away the largest collection of historical ancedotes of fratricide of any single source and it is cited widely in this chapter.5 OTA also contracted for two papers on fratricide and they are used freely in this chapter.6

Courtlandt Dixon Barnes Bryan, Friendly Fire (New Yorkj NY: Putna.q 1976).

Charles Schrader, Amicicide: The Problem of Friendly Fire in Modern War (Fort Leavenwo!@ KS: U.S. Army Comman d and General Staff College, 1982). 5

c Richard R. Muller, “Fratricide and Aerial Warfare: An Historical Overview” and John C. Imnnquest and W. Blair Hayworth, Jr., ‘‘OTA Fratricide Study.”

—. —

.—

Chapter 2–Historical Review of the Causes of Fratricide 9

This chapter is organized not by chronology but rather by the lessons important to finding technical and procedural solutions to the problem of fratricide. This approach is necessarily somewhat arbitrary since fratricide almost always results from a complex and confused chain of mistakes, making strict categorization impossible. (A gunner may aim toward a friendly target because he is disoriented but certainly will not pull the trigger unless he also fails to identify the target properly. Is the fratricide then due to his disorientation or his failure in identification?) The chapter concentrates on, but does not restrict itself to, American experience. This should not, of course, imply that the U.S. military has a particularly serious problem with fratricide; even a quick glance at military history shows that every army that has fired a shot has had to take into consideration hitting one of their own, or else quickly learn hard lessons. Following the historical anecdotes are some data from the National Training Center—an instrumented, automated facility for combat manuevers--and finally a synopsis of the Persian Gulf incidents.

TYPES OF FRATRICIDE There are no universally accepted definitions of friendly fire’ or ‘‘fratricide. The broadest— and older-definitions include any case in which anyone is hurt by a weapon from his own side other than his own. Thus, if an artillery round is faulty and falls short on friendly forces, that is friendly free; but if it is faulty and blows up in the breech and kills the artilleryman pulling the lanyard, that is an accident. More recently, the military has adopted definitions that exclude pure accidents and grossly malfunctioning equipment.

7

The narrowest definition would include only willful, but mistaken, attacks on friendly forces. The current Army Training and Doctrine Command (TRADOC) definition is: ‘‘The act of firing on friendly personnel or equipment, believing that you are engaging the enemy. ’ This report uses a definition that excludes purely mechanical malfunctions but includes all other cases of friendly personnel receiving fire from weapons operated by other friendly personnel. Perhaps surprisingly, the material difference between the definitions is not great since few fratricide result solely from equipment failure.

1 Fratricides Due to Accidents Malfunctions always occur, of course, and when dealing with weapons, they can be deadly. For example, in 1968, an F-4 flying to support troops engaged near Ban Me Thout, Vietnam, dropped a napalm canister on a church, killing 13 civilians. The cause was determined to be simply a faulty bomb rack.8 More often, however, malfunctions are just part of a chain of errors, sometimes compounded by human actions. For example, in World War 11, the lead bomber of a group would determine the target and all others in the group would release upon seeing the leader’s release. During the attack on the Abbey of Monte Cassino in March 1944, a bomb rack malfunction resulted in the premature release by a lead bomber, which resulted in its and others’ bombs being dropped on friendly positions. Similarly, on July 24 of that year, during the preparation for the breakout toward St. Lo, when the bomb rack on one lead bomber prematurely released, the other 15 bombers in the group immediately released their loads; unfortu-

Briefing entitled, “TRADOC Fratricide Study” (undated but received 1992). Note that, in practice, the Army does not always stick with this very strict definition, For example, some of the incidents from the Persian Gulf would have to be called “accidents” if using this wow definition, 8

Schrader, op. cit., footnote 5, p. 55.

. . . . . . .— ---- -- . -. --- . . - . . . - - - -

10 I Who Goes There: Friend or Foe?

nately they landed on the U.S. 30th Infantry Division, killing 25 and wounding 131. 9 Ever since World War I, cases of rear gunners damaging their own aircraft have been common and continue to the present. Helicopter gunships are equipped with traverse-limiting rods that prevent the side-door machine-guns from swinging so far to either side that rounds could hit the helicopter. When such a rod broke on one helicopter during the Vietnam War, the gunner in the heat of battle tracked a target so far forward that he fired into the cockpit and wounded the pilot. Even when weapons operate properly, unfortunate circumstances can cause what, in the broadest sense at least, might be classed as fratricide rather than accident. In the early morning hours of 5 November 1942 during the second Battle of Guadalcanal, the destroyer Walke was hit by Japanese naval guns and torpedoes. With the burning destroyer clearly sinking just a few minutes after being hit, the battleship Washington passed close by and launched life rafts for the Walke’s crew. However, when the destroyer went down soon after, the depth charges on its hull exploded—just as they were designed to when reaching a certain depth-killing many of the crew in the water above.10 Some accidents due to human error could be avoided by different equipment design. A U.S. bomber in World War H bombed an air base of the U.S. Ninth Tactical Air Force after the bomber was hit accidentally by a packet of chaff; the surprise caused the bombardier to hit mistakenly the bomb release switch.11 During the Vietnam

War, an F-100 attacking a North Vietnamese Army Headquarters instead dropped bombs over a kilometer short on U.S. troops when the pilot hit the bomb release while trying to adjust the aircraft’s trim button.12 S Fratricide Due to Command and

Control Failures Failure of command and control is a far more common cause of fratricide than simple failure of equipment. Command and control includes telling units where to be, having units know where they are, and keeping units properly informed of the locations of neighbors. The nighttime Battle of Cape Esperance began late on the night of October 11, 1942, with the destroyer Duncan breaking away from her group and charging off in total darkness toward a formidable Japanese fleet. The Duncan closed on a Japanese cruiser and opened fire. The crews of the American cruisers, seeing gun flashes very near known Japanese cruisers, assumed that the flashes came from a Japanese ship and attacked with eight inch guns. The flashes stopped almost immediately. Very likely the target had been the hapless Duncan, which was in flames, unable to free, and sinking within ten minutes of leaving its group. (Misidentification had been her downfall but it might also have saved her from further attack. During the Japanese retreat, the Japanese apparently also assumed that the ship within their midst was Japanese and did not attack, although heavy cruisers passing very close by could have disintegrated the little destroyer with a single salvo. 13)

9 Robert H. George, ‘‘The Battle of France,” in The Army Air Forces in World War II, Volume Three, Europe: Argument to V-E Day, January 1944 to May 1945, Wesley Frank Craven and James ha Cate, eds. (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing OffIce, 1983), pp. 228-277. 10 ~5 repated a s~w ~agedy

of a week ~lier when the des~oyer ~fey S* ~d her

&p~ chmges killed several C)f those few (Xew

members that were able to abandon ship. C.W. Kilpatrick, The Naval Nigh Battles in the Solomons (Pompano Beack FL: Exposition Press of ~Oli@ 1987), pp. 91, ] ] 8, and 121. 1 I by h Forces, op. cit., footnote 9, p. 230.

12 Sctiader, op. cit., foomote 5, p. 58. 13 Kflpa~&, op. cit., foomote 10, pp. 52-64.

..

— — .—— ..—

Chapter 2–Historical Review of the Causes of Fratricide! 11

The occasional misplaced shot is bad enough, but worse fratricide can occur when two friendly units start exchanging fire. One unit fires by mistake and the other unit-assuming fire to be a positive identification of enemy—returns fire. On August 8, 1944 during the fighting on Guam, two battalions of the 77th Infantry Division got into a prolonged fire fight. The exchange might have started as each side fried off several mortar rounds to calibrate the weapons’ emplacement positions before settling down for the night. Rounds from each side fell near the other; both assumed that it was Japanese fire and thus returned fire with small arms and more mortars. This firing, of course, made it obvious to each unit that the other was enemy and then the accompanying tanks got involved. A real firefight was under way. Finally, their mistake became apparent, in part when each battalion called up the same artillery battalion to request that artillery fire be directed at the other. A similar exchange became one of the worst cases of fratricide in the Vietnam War. One artillery unit aimed its guns correctly but used the wrong powder charge so the rounds went too far and landed on another U.S. artillery position. The second position responded with deadly accurate counterbattery fire. This duel went on for over 20 minutes and resulted in 90 casualties, all from friendly fire.14 Command and control procedures can prevent fratricide when identification is difficult. From the time that aircraft were first used for ground support in World War I, airmen knew that identification of ground units would be difficult. General William ‘‘Billy’ Mitchell said, “Our pilots had to fly right down and almost shake hands with the infantry on the ground to find out where they were. ’15 To avoid fratricide, both of infantry and pilots, World War I military com-

B-17s of Eighth Army Air Force bombing Berlin in 1944. One plane strays beneath another and has its tail clipped by falling bombs. Even perfect identification of

friends will not eliminate all fratricide.

14 sc~ader,

op.

cit., footnote 5) P. 1. 2

15 Ric~rd Hallion ~frjjre From f~e Sk),,. The ~i$tov,

1989), p. 39.

~}f Bar(/efie/dAir Ar~ack, ]9]]-1945 (Was~~on, DC: Smithsonian Institution

pI13SS,

---- . . . - ..-. — - -- -- - - - — --- - - - -

12 I Who Goes There: Friend or Foe?

manders divided up combat areas into ‘‘no-fwe” zones and “free-fire" zones. 16 At the outbreak of World War II, the Germans had the best developed system for air-ground coordination. They began with a World War I system of colored panels to mark infantry positions. This worked well in the attacks on Poland until Polish defenses broke and the German army began a war of maneuver. The German 10th Panzer Division then reported ‘constant” attacks by friendly airplanes. 17 The same story was . repeated on the Western front, the Germans introduced a system of safety lines (Sicherheitslinie) to avoid attacks on their own troops,18 which worked well at first but, again, once a war of maneuver began deep in French territory, fratricidal attacks increased sharply. Clearly, in both cases above the change was not in the ability to identify; German pilots did not suddenly forget how to identify tanks that they could have identified the day before. Rather, identification had been difficult all along and operational command and control procedures, developed to serve in lieu of identification, broke down when the character of the fighting changed. Recognizing the importance of rapid maneuver, and the strain it placed on any operational measures to avoid fratricide, the Germans worked diligently to develop better ground-to-air signaling and training programs to increase pilots’ identification skills. The single most famous case of fratricide illustrates the extreme difficulty of coordinating a complex attack by hundreds of elements, even along a stationary front. The carpet bombing in

World War II classroom instruction in aircraft identification using resin models.

preparation for the Normandy breakout near St. Lo was filled with problems, with those precipitated by mechanical failure of a bomb rack cited above being just the beginning. German defenses around the Allied armies in Normandy were tenacious but spread thin. Allied commanders decided that a single, concentrated blow would breach the defenses, allowing Allied armor to pour through the gap. The plan to puncture the defenses was called Operation COBRA. The first phase of the breakout was to be a carpet bombing of German positions. The attack was to start with 380 medium bombers hitting specific targets, followed by over 1,500 heavy bombers, B-17s and B-24s, dropping over 3,300 tons of bombs, with over 500 fighter-bombers and divebombers attacking anything that survived. For three hours, the sky would be filled with airplanes. 19

16 M~~~ ~Wer, ~d,, The united StateSAi~S~~iC~ in world w~~], vo~, II (washingto~ Dc: Office of Air Force fistory, 1978), p. 373. 17 Williamson Murray, “The Luftwaffe Experience, 193941, ‘‘ in B.F. Cooling, cd., Case Studies in the History of Close Air Support (Washington DC: Office of Air Force History, 1990), pp. 85-86. 16 Ge.do. ~. ~eekows$ Ia, ~age~eft Z. Km Nr 2, ‘‘Zusamrnenarbeit d der Luftwaffe, ’ National ArChiWS and Records

Administration Washington (NARA) T3 14/615/372-393. 19 ~ese nub~s come from Cmven ad Cate, op. cit., foo~ote 9, p. 232. Most of the narrative is taken from MilrhXl“ Blumensoq Breakout and Pursuit (WashingtorL DC: Department of the Army, OffIce of the Chief of Military History, 1961), pp. 228-239. Part of the problem with

a historical review of fratricide can be seen by a comparison of these two “official” histories, one by the Air Force, the other by the Army. The Army was on the receiving end and their history relates much of the controversy between the air and ground commands, while the Air Force history states somewhat matter-of-factly that “Wchnically viewed, the bombing was good. ” (p. 233)

.

.

Chapter 2—Historical Review of the Causes of Fratricide 13

The attack was delayed a week by weather, Then the July 24, 1944 attack was partially underway when it, too, was called off because of low visibility. (But not before the inauspicious short bombing described above.) Finally, the main attack took place on July 25. General Omar Bradley thought that the benefit of the bombing would be greatest if the infantry attack could follow immediately after. He wanted ground forces as close as 800 yards even though the air commanders warned that 3,000 yards was the closest safe distance. They compromised at 1,450 yards. Bradley and other ground commanders had insisted that the bombers approach parallel to the front, so that any ‘‘short’ bombing would result in bombing the wrong Germans, not in bombing the wrong side. The air commanders argued that this made their machines too vulnerable to antiaircraft fire. Bradley seems to have believed that he had agreement when he left the last planning meeting. Years later he insisted that “the Air Force brass simply lied” about the direction of the attack.20 With so many aircraft, mistakes were inevitable, Visibility was poor. Heavies were to bomb from 15,000 feet but a layer of clouds forced many down to 12,000 feet, which in turn forced groups to reassemble in crowded skies and bombardiers to recalculate bombing solutions in flight. Allied positions were marked with smoke, which was hard to see in the haze and essentially useless once the bombing started, since the bomb explosions raised mountains of dust that mixed with the smoke. Human error was the cause of most of the short bombings. Mistakes were disastrous when committed by the lead plane of a group because command and control procedures called for the lead plane to sight the target and all other planes to release when the leader did. One lead plane had

20 l-l~lio~ op. cit., fOOtIIOte 15, p. *11.

a broken bomb sight and released visually. Another bombardier thought he was on target but was orienting on the wrong landmarks. Succeeding flights of bombers would almost never be able to see their targets because of the dust raised by first salvos. Therefore, their attempts to bomb targets were really the bombing of dust clouds, under which they hoped the bombs would find targets on their own. Unfortunately, in this case, wind blew the dust toward U.S. positions and every wave of bombers struck a little closer. The war correspondent Ernie Pyle wrote later: As we watched there crept into our consciousness a realization that windows of exploding bombs were easing back towards us, flight by flight, instead of gradually easing forward, as the plan called for. Then we were horrified by the suspicion that these machines, high in the sky and completely detached from us, were aiming their bombs at the smokeline on the ground, and a gentle breeze was drifting the smokeline back over us! An indescribable kind of panic comes over you at such times. We stood tensed in muscle

Soldiers of the U.S. 30th Infantry Division dig out after being bombed near St. Lo by the U.S. Eighth Army Air Force.

14 I Who Goes There: Friend or Foe?

and frozen in intellect, watching each flight approach and pass over us, feeling trapped and completely helpless.21 A company commander wrote, The dive bombers came in beautifully and dropped their bombs right where they belonged. Then the first group of heavies dropped them in the draw several hundred yards in front of us. . . The next wave came in closer, the next still closer. The dust cloud was drifting back toward us. Then they came right on top of us. We put on all the orange smoke we had but I don’t think it did any good, they could not have seen it through the dust. ..22 The results of the misplaced bombing were deadly. Added to the casualties of the abortive attack on the 24th, the short bombings on July 25 caused official casualties of 490 wounded and 111 dead.23 In addition, the 30th Infantry Division alone reported over 160 casualties due to “combat fatigue, ” that is, soldiers simply stunned by the experience but not necessarily showing any bodily damage. Among the dead was Lieutenant General Leslie McNair, Commanding General of the Army Ground Forces, pro tern commander of the 1st U.S. Army Group, and a strong supporter of air-ground combined operations. He had come to the forward area on the 25th specifically to help morale after the short bombings of the 24th.24 He was killed instantly and could be identified only by his West Point ring.25 The bombings at St. Lo caused resentment between air and ground commanders. The com-

mander of the 30th Infantry Division said, ‘Theres no excuse, simply no excuse at all. I wish I could show some of those air boys, decorated with everything a man can be decorated with, some of 26 our casualty clearing stations." General Dwight D. Eisenhower reportedly swore never to use heavy bombers in combat support again, but their usefulness was too apparent and the ban did not last. On the positive side, Operation COBRA also motivated important U.S. improvements in command and control of bomber groups and in procedures for marking of friendly lines on the ground. During Operation QUEEN, the Allied attempt to breach the Roer River, a carpet bombing preparation like that for Operation COBRA was to open the way for the infantry. This time giant fluorescent cloth panels marked the positions of friendly troops and tethered balloons flew parallel to the front line. U.S. troops also marked their positions by using their 9 0 millimeter antiaircraft cannon to fire red smoke shells straight up, and the bombing went well.27 Repeating the earlier German experience, however, the Allies found that these command and control procedures-depending on careful marking— broke down as soon as a war of maneuver began. In operations near Cherbourg, a single British division, the 51st Highland, on a single day, August 18, 1944, reported 40 separate attacks by friendly aircraft (more than occurred during the entire Persian Gulf War).28 On August 7, 1944 during OperationTOTALIZE— a franticly paced and fluid attempt to cut off a

21 Cited @ Mm H~~gs, over/oral: D.Day, June 6, 1944 (New York NY: Simon and Schuster, 1984), p. 254. 22 Blume~oq op. cit., footnote 19, P. 237. 23 Ibid., p. 236. 24 Rob@ L, HeWrit~ ~~~~ ~orSe ~~t~e ~eSfern ~~ont: ~~e ~Iory

Of f~e j~t~ ]~~a~fry Djvjsion ~uhingt(l~ DC: hlfillltry Jod PIESS,

1946), p. 37. 25 Russ~~ Weigley, ~~Sen~ower’S f.ieu(enanfS

@100mingtou IN: Indiana University press, 1981), p.

170.

26 Hmtigs, op. cit., foomote 21, p. 255. 27 Kent Ro~~ Gree~lcld, ( ‘Ax-DIy Ground Forces md Air-Ground Battle Team, ” Study No. 35 (Historiczd Section: Army Ground Forces,

1948), p. 89. 28 HM~g,

Op. cit., fo’o~ote

21? p. 303-

——

...—.— — — ——.

-. —

Chapter 2–Historical Review of the Causes of Fratricide [ 15

huge German force fleeing through Falaise--U.S. heavy bombers bombed short, causing 300 casualties among British, Canadian, and Polish ground forces. A week later, British bombers attacked U.S. Army forces. The primary culprit was a failure of inter-allied coordination. U.S. Army units used yellow smoke to mark their positions while the Royal Air Force used yellow smoke to mark its targets. A historian records one witness saying, " . . . the more the troops burnt yellow flares to show their position the more the errant aircraft bombed them.”29 Sometimes failures of communication have forced gunners to fire on forces knowing full well that they are friendly. By the very strictest definition--that is, willful but mistaken attacks on friendly forces—this would not be friendly fire. The German general Guderian recounts how, during the blitzkrieg into France, Luftwaffe airplanes attacked his units. The ground units knew that the airplanes were German but were forced to return fire in simple self-defense. One pilot bailed out when flak hit his plane and Guderian himself was waiting for him on the ground.30 General Omar Bradley recalls that a flight of American A-36s attacked his armored column in Sicily. The tankers properly identified the aircraft as friendly and lit off yellow smoke flares, the markers for ‘‘friendly’ armor, but the attacks continued so the tanks returned fire and downed one of the planes, When the pilot parachuted to earth, the tank commander said, ‘‘Why you silly sonuvabitch, didn’t you see our yellow recognition signals?” To which the pilot replied, “Oh. . . is that what it was? ’31 On August 15, during the breakout from Normandy, one American fighter pilot had the bad luck to mistakenly strafe the headquarters of

the XIX Tactical Air Command near Laval. Antiaircraft gunners knew full well that the plane was American but again for self-defense were forced to return fire. Flak brought him down. 32

I Fratricide Due to Fire Discipline Failures At the lowest level, ‘‘command and control’ devolves into something as straightforward as “fire discipline.’ Indeed, where command and control concerns the actions of units, fire discipline concerns the actions of the individual shooter. The following case illustrates a string of mistakes, fire discipline being just one: In the fighting in France, a group of eight tanks set out in low visibility in late afternoon of July 9, 1944. They were under strong pressure from superiors to make a symbolic advance by the end of the day. At a critical road junction, the group commander turned right instead of left, bringing them upon Company C of the 823 Tank Destroyer Battalion, later to hold a U.S. record for most German vehicles killed. Based on the tactical situation, the company expected no U.S. tanks to be on that road and the tanks were approaching from the direction of German lines; thus the company reasonably assumed that they were German. The first tank took a direct hit from a 76 millimeter antitank cannon and was destroyed. The others continued to advance and opened fire. At 400 yards, the defenders recognized the tanks as American. One very brave sergeant stood up and waved wildly to get the tanks to stop firing but they kept on. The defenders stopped firing, took cover, and hoped for the best. One of the passing tanks shot at an uncamouflaged halftrack at a range of 15 yards, wounding a driver. 33 This incident shows that

29 John Terraine, A Time for Courage: The RAF in the European War, 1939-1945 (New York NY: Macmillan, 1985), p. 661. 30 Hek Guderian, Panzer Leader (New York, NY: Duttoq 1952), p. 113. 31 Hallioq

op. cit., footnote 15, p. 178.

32 Craven and Cate, op. cit., footnote 9, VO1. HI, p. 255. 33 Sckader,

op. cit., footnote 5, p. 82.

. . . . - -- - .- . - . - -- - - -- . - - -- - - —

16 I Who Goes There: Friend or Foe?

!* u);” n z